If anything Australia's success was in spite of the federal government. Quarantine is a federal responsibility, and they keep shirking it just so they can blame state governments when covid escapes quarantine.
> And health is a state responsibility - yet people were all too willing to throw Scotty from Marketing under the bus on that.
The state governments haven't failed on health though? The federal government explicitly declined to let the states run the vaccination program in the way that they wanted and instead went GP-first (GPs being beholden effectively to the feds).
> And health is a state responsibility - yet people were all too willing to throw Scotty from Marketing under the bus on that.
This is a nothing statement. The state based health services have generally been very well run, with the exception of contact tracing in Victoria during 2020.
The federal health responsibilities (vaccines, quarantine and PPE provisioning) have all been spectacular failures.
The fact is the Australian federation model has an odd separation of responsibilities which makes this challenge uniquely difficult for Australia.